The widespread usage of desk or table positioned computerized word processing equipment in office and residential settings has created a substantial need for drawers, slidable trays, and the like which have decks or platforms with compartments or recesses defined in interior top working surface portions. Such compartments are needed for easily accessible, organized storage of not only conventional office supplies, such as pencils, paper clips, rubber bands, paper and the like, but also word processing supplies, such as discs, a mouse, a keyboard and similar components.
To make a compartmentalized tray structure of wood involves substantial labor and material costs, while to make such a structure of a molded thermoplastic involves substantial material costs and expensive, relatively large plastic molding machinery. Forming such a structure from a relatively thin sheet of thermoformable plastic or of stampable metal appears to be economically feasible, but the resulting formed sheet typically lacks sufficient structural rigidity, thereby making it unstable and difficult to fasten to other components, such as walls members, slide rails and the like. Further, stamping machines for metal sheeting are expensive, particularly with regard to dies, and the potential shapes that can be produced are limited.
There is a need for a compartmentalized structure which is sufficiently rigid for practical use and which is combinable as a subassembly with other selected components to comprise a drawer assembly, a slidable tray assembly, a storage pedestal assembly, or the like. The present invention satisfies this need.